4930 Hagley Hall

4930 Hagley Hall was built at the Great Western Railway’s Swindon Works and entered traffic in May 1929, at a cost of £5,107. The locomotive is named after Hagley Hall in Worcestershire.

Its first shed allocation was Wolverhampton Stafford Road.

BR motive power depot allocations since 1948.

Date Arrived	Depot
January 1948	Tyseley
November 1948	St Philips Marsh
December 1948	Weymouth
April 1952	St Philips Marsh
October 1953	Westbury
April 1958	Taunton
May 1960	Exeter
September 1960	Taunton
October 1960	Exeter
July 1962	Old Oak Common
September 1962	Swindon

After moving around the midland and southern sections of the Western Region it was withdrawn in December 1963, having covered the impressive total of 1,295,236 miles and was sold to Woodham’s scrapyard in Barry, arriving there in April 1964.

4930 was purchased by the Severn Valley Railway Holdings Company in June 1972 and was hauled by rail to Bewdley on 6th January 1973. The story goes that Sir Gerald Nabarro, when he was chairman of the Severn Valley Railway, bought it because of its name and the fact he was a good friend of Lord Cobham whose family seat is Hagley Hall.

Renovation commenced at Bewdley and continued in earnest at Bridgnorth in 1978. Its return to passenger working took place on 22nd September 1979. 4930 Hagley Hall was selected to haul the official reopening train for Kidderminster Town Station on 30th July 1984. In 1979, and ran back on the mainline reaching as far south as Plymouth (deputising for a failed King class) and north to Chester.

4930 was also one of the regular locomotives used on the mainline in 1985 during the 150th anniversary of the Great Western Railway alongside 3440 City of Truro, 5051 Drysllwyn Castle, 6000 King George V, 7029 Clun Castle, 7819 Hinton Manor, 75069 & 92220 Evenning Star. As part of this 4930 features in the 1986 documentary “Steam Days” with Miles Kington on a run out from Bristol to Plymouth with fellow GWR engine Drysllwyn Castle.

4930 Also featured running passenger trains on the SVR In the 1986 programme The Great Western Experience alongside other GWR locomotives, such as 5764, 5051 Drysllwyn Castle, and 6998 Burton Agnes Hall.

Withdrawal from SVR traffic came in October 1986, after suffering failure of several boiler stays. Although this was considered an insignificant repair, with only a short amount of time left on its boiler ticket (a legal requirement every 10 years) before requiring an overhaul, such work could not be justified. Between 1986 and 1999 it was stored at Bridgnorth with other locomotives, awaiting its turn for overhaul.

After its withdrawal pending overhaul it was loaned in 1999 to the Macarthur Glen shopping centre in Swindon as a static exhibit. In June 2007 it was returned to the Severn Valley Railway intending to take its place in the new ‘Engine House’ outside Highley railway station. The Engine House, after a long delay to the floods that hit the railway in June 2007 is now open and Hagley Hall was placed on show.

In October 2013, 4930 was moved from the Engine house to Bridgnorth so that restoration could begin. The restoration is being supported by the SVR Charitable Trust and the Friends of Locomotive Hagley Hall Group and is expected to cost around £400,000. The money for the overhaul was raised for by members of the public who subscribed to the SVR’s share offer scheme that they had planned to help restore 4930 and some matching Great Western coaches (This has raised £2 million). 4930 has swapped its Hawksworth tender for Witherslack Hall’s Collett tender, which is currently the main focus of the overhaul. 4930’s overhaul will take at least 2 to 3 years with a return to traffic projected for 2019.

In October 2016 a newly constructed tank for the tender was delivered to the SVR.

As part of the overhaul new castings of the cylinders are required as the one on the locomotive are life expired. Early in 2017 the restoration of the locomotive had begun in earnest but it is unlikely to return to steam again until 2020.

In June 2018 the frames were lifted from the wheels at the Severn Valley Railway prior to the wheels being sent to the South Devon Railway for replacement tyres.

By October 2018 the frames had been shotblasted to remove corrosion and repainted. New cylinders casts were anticipated to be completed by Harco Engineering Ltd at Briery Hill by the end of the year By this time the boiler had been dismantled and assessed at Northern Steam Engineering and some repair work completed.

At the end of October 2018 the driving and bogie wheelsets were returned from the South Devon Railway following a re-profiling of the wheels.

It was hoped that the locomotive would be back in steam in 2020. This view was reinforced in October 2019 when the Severn Valley Railway’s engineering services manager said that he expects the repaired boiler to be steam tested before the end of 2019. The boiler work was undertaken by Northern Steam Engineering.

A fire was lit in the boiler for the first time for 34 years in November 2020. The following month the boiler was returned to the Severn Valley Railway at Bridgnorth. It was hoped to have the locomotive in operation during 2021 but in December 2021 it was reported that the boiler cladding was being fitted after successful trial fitting of the boiler.

In December 2021 the boiler was lifted back onto the rolling chassis at Bridgnorth.

In May the locomotive moved under its own steam again. This was for the first time it had done so for 36 years but no date has yet been set for the completion of the overhaul and its return to service.